


A Father's Love

by Calacious



Series: Ho oku i [10]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Cheesiness, Fluff and Angst, Grace has both Steve and Danny wrapped around her little finger, Love, M/M, Public Display of Affection, Steve Feels, talent show
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-02-22
Packaged: 2018-03-14 13:39:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3412685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/pseuds/Calacious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve thinks that stakeouts are far less stressful than waiting to hear if his soon to be step-daughter placed in her school's talent show.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Father's Love

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by my school's talent show -- a student persistently begged me to attend; I'm glad I attended.
> 
> I don't own the characters of this work of fiction, and I don't make money from writing this.
> 
> Much thanks to inosine for reading through and showing me where things could be tweaked, and animegirl1129 who encouraged me to write. 
> 
> Let me know if you liked this. Should I include more Grace in these Steve/Danny stories?

"My little monkey's so grown up," Danny whispers, voice filled with awe, heart swelling.

His eyes are riveted to the stage, watching his baby girl perform a complicated dance number with two of her best friends, Tihani and Leilani. They're dressed in traditional hula apparel, hips swaying to the music, hands moving to tell an ancient story. It's beautiful.

Danny's got his phone held high in one hand, shamelessly recording the performance. His other hand is loosely gripping Steve's in a natural, outward display of love that he seems completely unaware of. It's become second nature to them, though it's been awhile since they've held hands like this, and they haven't displayed their affection much publicly.

Steve's got one eye trained on Grace, and another on Danny, admiring the man's love for his daughter.

Love is evident in the way that Danny's eyes crinkle at the edges, and the way that Danny's lips turn up slightly at the corners. His face is bathed in light from his phone, illuminating his eyes in such a way that they almost seem to sparkle. His grip tightens suddenly when Grace starts her short solo, belying the man's nerves on behalf of the little girl who has her father wrapped around her little finger. Truth is, she's got Steve wrapped around her little finger too, and he holds his breath as she dances, mentally running through the choreography that she'd shown them last week.

Love is the way that Danny holds his breath during his daughter's performance, tears gathering in his eyes, hand squeezing Steve's hard enough to make it ache. He's willing to put up with the pain, though, because it reminds him that Danny's here, that he didn't lose him countless months ago, and that he promised to stay.

Danny's sitting on the edge of his seat, drinking it all in, a look of rapt awe on his face. Overwhelmed, Steve's heart swells with love of his own for Danny, for Grace.

When the performance is over, Danny stands, dragging his hand away, and tucking his phone away in his back pocket, so that he can clap for his little girl who stands proudly on stage. Steve feels bereft, a little unsure, though he stands up beside Danny. He claps too, certain that the thunderous applause that he hears reverberating throughout the school's gymnasium is not a figment of his imagination, but a product of Grace, and the other girls', performance.

Tears dance in Danny's eyes, glitter on his cheeks, and Steve reaches for his hand as Danny retakes his seat, only to sit on the edge of it, poised ready to stand at a moment's notice, should his little girl need him. He's always been that way around Grace, always on alert for trouble, even where there isn't any.

Grace holds her head high, her hips canted at an angle, bare feet posed just so beneath the colorful hula skirt. There's a broad smile on her face that mirrors that of her father's. Her cheeks are flushed, and her eyes shine with excitement, and accomplishment. Steve's proud of his, soon to be official, step-daughter, though he's a little lost, unsure of where he fits into all of this. Big family events were never a McGarrett thing, and he doesn't want to mess this up.

Danny's smile could encompass the world, and Steve's heart feels like it's going to burst when Danny turns that smile toward him.

The rest of the night's performances pass by in a blur for Steve. Some of them are good, but, in his opinion, none of them hold a candle to Grace's performance, and judging by the looks that cross Danny's face throughout the rest of the talent show, he feels the same way. He _is_ Grace's father, though; it's only natural for him to feel that she's the best, and that her performance outshines everyone else's.

Steve isn't sure what's supposed to be normal for an almost step-father, but he doubts that his desire to intimidate the judges into making the 'right' decision is something that Danny would sanction. Steve refuses to believe that his feelings are biased. Grace, and her friends _were_ better than anyone else's tonight, hands down. It would take a blind person not to notice that. Steve hopes that the judges aren't blind, that he _can_ stay in his seat after the last performance and wait for the numbers to be tallied without any 'help' from him.

The final performance of the night, put on by the MC, does little to distract the anxious audience of parents and students from the fact that the numbers are being tallied, and third, second and first place winners being determined by the judges. Who knew waiting to hear your not-yet-step-daughter's name called for placement in a talent show could make you sweat? It's mildly comforting that Danny's anxious too, at least that's what Steve assumes when he loses the blood flow in his fingers because Danny's squeezing them a little too hard as he waits to hear if Grace, and her friends, placed.

_Working a stakeout is less stressful than this,_ Steve thinks, and a sidelong glance toward his partner confirms that Danny's as anxious as he is to find out what place Grace and her friends took. His face is pinched, his eyes narrowed. Steve squeezes Danny's hand in reassurance, brushes his thumb across his knuckles, and releases a breath when Danny seems to relax a little.

"Those twins were really good," Danny says. He doesn't take his eyes off of the stage, laughs halfheartedly at the MC's bad joke, and squeezes Steve's hand hard enough to make him wince.

"Not as good as Grace," Steve says, stealing a sidelong glance at Danny.

He wants to say something that will ease some of the tension that Danny - that he - feels, but there are no words, and he's still not sure that having a quiet talk with the judges is completely off the table. He might even be able to persuade Danny to go up there with him.

Danny settles back in his seat, loosening the death grip on Steve's hand. The look that he gives Steve - a mixture of love, gratitude, and something intangible - is enough to make Steve's breath hitch. He's reminded of how he almost lost Danny, and, by that same token, Grace.

The little girl isn't even his, but he thinks he's finally starting to understand why Danny couldn't let Rachel take her away from him. Why a custody settlement of every other holiday and summer visits was unacceptable. Why Danny moved to Hawaii, and refused to let Rachel and Stan move away with his little girl once he'd finally accepted the place as his home.

"She was great, wasn't she?" Danny asks, the slight lilt in his voice gives away just how self-conscious he is that he's seeing things through father-tinted lenses.

Steve isn't so sure that he can trust his own vision either, but the couple sitting in front of them turn around and enthuse over the dance that the three girls performed, claiming that it was one of the best performances, that it even outshone their own child's singing number.

Steve participates in the small talk, though he leaves most of the talking to Danny and finds himself smiling, nodding, and occasionally making what Danny would no doubt term Neanderthal grunts of approval in response. The other couple doesn't seem to notice, and they turn around to face the front when the MC announces that the results have been tallied.

"Grace is a winner, no matter what," Steve whispers to Danny, feeling heat creep up the back of his neck, because the words had sounded better in his head than they do aloud.

Danny nods and takes a deep breath. "Yeah, she is. When I was her age, no way could I take the stage like that. She's so beautiful and brave and..."

"A lot like her father," Steve adds.

He squeezes Danny's hand in support. The wait's killing him, and it's not even for something bad, like or waiting for a scumball to talk, or the time that Danny couldn't move a muscle, because if he did, a bomb would go off.

Steve doesn't want to know what it will feel like when Grace is sick, or injured, because he can barely handle the pressure when the stakes are nothing more than the possibility that her ego will take a hit. The thought of teary-eyed, maybe even openly weeping Grace terrifies him. He knows Danny well enough to know that, if his daughter doesn't place, he will treat her like a princess, and make her feel like a winner. Her ego won't suffer for long if it _is_ wounded.

The twins place third, and Steve's heart is in his throat. Danny's at the edge of his seat again, phone at the ready. Steve almost misses the announcement through what feels to him like uproarious applause as Grace, and her friends, take the stage.

"That's my monkey!" Danny shouts, and turns to embrace Steve in a moment of impulsiveness, which should not have taken him off guard, because it's Danny, and Danny has never shied away from overt, physical displays.

Steve mentally cringes, certain that Grace will be embarrassed by her father's enthusiastic exclamation. Apparently unphased, she's grinning ear-to-ear and waving in their direction. Danny takes several pictures as he moves toward the stage with Steve trailing in his wake.

This is new to Steve, all of it, and he's not sure if he has the right to join Danny, if it's okay for him to slip his phone from his pocket and snap off the half dozen photos that he does of Grace and her friends posing with their winnings - a set of gift cards and a trophy. He'd never done any of this when he was a kid. He'd played sports, and sometimes his mother and father would be in the stands, cheering him on, but most of the time they'd be busy with work, especially when he'd gotten older.

Steve doesn't even know who won first place. It doesn't matter. His attention is on Danny and Grace, and his heart feels like it's going to burst right out of his chest, which kind of terrifies him, because if this is what happiness feels like, then he's going to have a heart attack from celebrating Grace's future accomplishments. The girl is amazing, just like her dad, and Steve isn't sure that his heart can handle it, at least not unless it grows a couple sizes bigger like Dr. Suess' Grinch's had.

Danny blindly reaches for his hand, pulling Steve up beside him, and Steve wonders if this is what it'll be like once they're married. If his place will be beside Danny, and likewise, Danny's beside him, in everything, no matter how big or small. He hopes so.

"I'm so proud of you, Gracie," Danny gushes when the ceremony's over and they're heading out to celebrate at Grace's favorite restaurant. Though she's bordering on being much too big for this kind of thing, Danny lifts her up and twirls her around before placing a kiss on her nose and setting her down on her feet, and then settling a hand on the small of Steve's back.

"I thought Michaela was going to place. She was so good," Grace says, and she launches into a recap of the evening's performances, supplementing the retelling with added details about her classmate's lives. Steve's head is spinning by the time they reach his truck, and he wonders how Danny can follow the girl's rambling thoughts. If he'll ever learn the knack of it. He's learned how to follow Danny's rants and his often tangential manner of speaking, but Grace seems to be talking at warp speeds right now. She's more hyped up than Steve's ever seen her.

_Like father, like daughter,_ Steve thinks. _Grace has definitely inherited her father's long-windedness._

He catches Danny's reflection in the rear view mirror as the man responds to something Grace has said. Danny smiles and winks at him, reaches for his hand and squeezes it - a silent, _I love you._


End file.
